Cronicle of our move to the northern coast of Peru and building a home at El Nuro.

Monday, November 9, 2009

09 November

Doug's spanish teacher didn't show up this morning, so he spent the early morning on our property laying things out in preparation for building.

At eleven, we met up with our young friend Feruquo, and drove to Talara. We received the final plans for the house including structural, electrical, sanitation and water plans. We put these files on a zip drive and wanted to get them printed on large size paper. There wasn't anyone in the Los Organos or Mancora area who had the equipment to do this. It took some looking and asking for location, but we finally found the company in Talara that would do this. When he saw there were thirty-two pages to print, he said it would take him several hours to complete the project. We couldn't wait that long because Feruquo needed to take his parents to the bus station mid afternoon. We arranged to have the plans printed, rolled, and then sent by bus to Los Organos. The plans were S/. 7 each ($2.50) and the freight was S/. 5 ($1.75). We should be able to pick the plans up sometime tomorrow.

While we were in Talara, we searched for yarn for the tapestry I'm now working on. After inquirying in several shops, we were finally directed to one that had a limited number of colors and a limited amount of each. I purchased several colors and can only hope the amount will be enough.

We returned to El Nuro and then took Feruquo to lunch at El Refugio. I really enjoy their octopus stir fry, while Doug enjoys the shrimp curry. The food there is quite excellent!

We said good-bye to Feruquo and headed to the market in Los Organos to find a measuring cup and baking pan for the sourdough bread. The sponge is ready and has a really nice aroma! I'm excited to try it out. We'll have to take it to one of the chefs we know so they can use it and feed it while we are gone.

This afternoon Doug sat out on the patio and watched a team of fishermen lay out their nets.

There are two boats somewhat similar to the river drift boats in Oregon. They paddle their boats stern to stern. Each has a net aboard, and they join the nets and then take off in opposite directions, laying their nets out as they go. They make a big circle and then spiral in toward the center. Then they start making noise in the water with some kind of plunger; we think to attract the fish. Then they reverse the process, pulling the net in as they go and removing the fish caught up in the net.

Sorry, some of these pictures are out of sequence. I spent the better part of an hour trying to put them in order without much luck. Hopefully you can figure out the order from our description of the process.

By the way, I love all of you who are following this blog. Only three people have become "followers" but I know many more are reading our entries. It would really be nice to know who all is reading the blog....send me a message?